Quotes by James Arthur Baldwin

“Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.”

“Know from whence you came. If you know whence you came, there are absolutely no limitations to where you can go.”

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone... they will be forced to deal with pain.”

“It is very nearly impossible to become an educated person in a country so distrustful of the independent mind”

“Money, it turned out, was exactly like sex, you thought of nothing else if you didnt have it and thought of other things if you did.”

“The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other, and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.”

“Experience, which destroys innocence, also leads one back to it.”

“Education is indoctrination if youre white - subjugation if youre black.”

“Love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters?”

“Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor.”

“Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck -- but, most of all, endurance.”

“The power of the white world is threatened whenever a black man refuses to accept the white worlds definitions.”

“I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”

“Fires cant be made with dead embers, nor can enthusiasm be stirred by spiritless men. Enthusiasm in our daily work lightens effort and turns even labor into pleasant tasks.”

“Be careful what you set your heart upon - for it will surely be yours.”

“To defend ones self against fear is simply to ensure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced.”

“The questions which one asks oneself begin, at least, to illuminate the world, and become ones key to the experience of others.”

“People who treat other people as less than human must not be surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes floating back to them, poisoned”

“It demands great spiritual resilience not to hate the hater whose foot is on your neck, and an even greater miracle of perception and charity not to teach your child to hate.”